Shaquilla Harrigan and Raka Sen have received the FLAS fellowship award to further their research both this summer and throughout the next academic year. The Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) Fellowships program provides allocations of academic year and summer fellowships to institutions of higher education or consortia of institutions of higher education to assist meritorious undergraduate students and graduate students undergoing training in modern foreign languages and related area or international studies or with the international aspects of professional or fields of study.
Shaquilla's research interrogates how the proliferation of INGOs in Africa may exacerbate inequalities across nationality, race, ethnicity, gender, and class. One area that she is researching now is the decision-making processes of these INGOs that influence their embeddedness in local communities. Through the Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) Academic Year and Summer Fellowships in African Languages, Harrigan will improve my Kiswahili language skills and gain additional knowledge of East African culture and social processes. Acquiring this expertise in Kiswahili and in African Studies is critical to my second-year master's paper and future dissertation work.
Raka's research looks at the ways in which adaptation to climate change amplifies gender divisions of labor in previously unseen ways. This work draws on fieldwork from the Sundarban Region of India and Bangladesh, one of the places most vulnerable to climate change, and where residents are actively battling against salt intrusion on their lands. This intrusion stems from multiple factors, but was exacerbated by Cyclone Aila in May 2009, as the storm swiftly and irreversibly salinated many villages in the region. Because of the salt, both men and women work more, take more risks, and work further from home, but interviews reveal the added household and care work that falls disproportionately on women. The 2019-20 Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) Academic Year Fellowship will give Sen the opportunity to sharpen her Bengali skills, learn regional dialects and teach her the region specific knowledge required for continued work in India and Bangladesh.